


A Night to Remember

by theonewhohums



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Dress Up, Dresses, Fluff and Humor, Humor, Multi, Prom
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-10
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2018-10-17 02:27:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10584519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theonewhohums/pseuds/theonewhohums
Summary: Promposals, choosing a dress, figuring out what corsage is, and having the night of their lives, the kids of Central High poorly navigate their way through all the traditions of prom (hopefully not breaking a prosthetic limb in the process). Couples featured: Ed/Ling, Lan Fan/Paninya, and platonic!Alphonse/Winry(Alternatively titled: A Shitty Prom AU)





	1. Promposal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ailaxolotl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ailaxolotl/gifts).



> This is a drabble collection I started for fun as a gift for my girl Aila (ailaxolotl on tumblr) because we both love EdLing and one day we started talking about which Brotherhood characters would be the best dancers. It got a little out of hand, and now I have like 15 drabbles lined up for this AU. I regret everything.

An explosion of confetti burst from a locker down the hall, and Ed clucked his tongue in pity.

“What’s that noise supposed to mean?” Ling asked, handing Ed his chem book to transfer out for trigonometry. For some reason he insisted on carrying Ed’s books to all of their classes, which seemed totally ridiculous when Ed had a _backpack_ specifically designed for that function.

Ed rolled his eyes. “Some poor sap just got asked out to prom in the messiest way possible. The prom proposals at this school get more and more ridiculous every year.”

Ling eyed the girl at the end of the hall, who was now holding a confetti-covered balloon with the word “Prom?” written on it. She was crying somewhat hysterically.

“I don’t know,” he said, “I think it’s kind of sweet, making a big deal about asking someone you love to prom.”

But Ed only snorted in response. “She’s not crying out of happiness, Ling. She’s crying because now all of her books are covered in glitter and small pieces of colorful paper. All because her boyfriend—who everyone assumed she was going with _anyway_ —asked her to prom by booby-trapping her locker."

Ling wasn’t sure if that was actually the case, but he had to admit that from a distance he couldn’t decipher if her tears were out of happiness or sadness. He eyed his boyfriend once more, who had finally gathered up all of his textbooks and was awkwardly transferring them in Ling’s outstretched hands.

“I just think it’s dumb to make such a spectacle out of something that’s basically guaranteed anyway. If you’re dating someone, you’re going to prom with them. End of story. There’s no need to add a layer of rom-com to it.” He readjusted his backpack straps more comfortably and finally looked up at Ling. “Right?”

Ling smiled amiably. “Right.”

He waited until Ed had started walking towards their trigonometry class to quickly text message Paninya and Alphonse to put away the party poppers and boombox they had set up in the cafeteria. They’d have to find another event to use that choreography for.


	2. Footloose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Lan Fan says "no" to Paninya's promposal for a fifth time, Ling finally needs to know why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be perfectly clear, I graduated from high school 5 years ago, so if people don't do any of this stuff anymore ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

Lan Fan couldn’t tell if Ling’s timing was horrible or if he was secretly a masochist, but asking Lan Fan about her love life in the middle of karate sparring was a dumb move on his part.

He had barely gotten out the sentence “I heard Paninya asked you to prom again” before Lan Fan had floored him with a swift kick to the gut. It took him a couple seconds before he was finally able to suck in a breath of air, and if Lan Fan was one for apologies, she might have done so once he was breathing again.

He coughed for a bit before glaring up at her from the padded floor of his basement. “I thought this was _semi_ -contact sparring.”

Lan Fan shrugged. “And I thought you said you were good at defense. I guess we were both misinformed.”

“That kick couldn’t have had anything to do with Paninya asking you to prom for the fifth time, would it?”

Lan Fan turned her back on Ling to grab her water bottle from near the wall. She took a long gulp of it instead of answering. She had discovered very early in her life that silence was a much better alternative to answering embarrassing questions.

“You know, instead of taking your frustration out on me, you could just talk to your girlfriend like any mature person would.”

She took another drink. Sparring sure made her thirsty.

“Come on, Lan Fan. We’re all going! Ed and I already bought our tickets, and I think Winry is even taking Alphonse as her date so all of us could be together one last time before we graduate. The only people missing are you and Paninya.”

“The only person missing is me. Paninya has been talking about prom for weeks. She’ll go with you guys.”

Ling was next to her now, grabbing own his water bottle and leaning a shoulder against the wall. “She said she wouldn’t buy her ticket until you bought yours.”

The flimsy plastic water bottle was swiftly crushed in Lan Fan’s grasp. “Why does she have to be so stubborn?”

“I rather think that’s one of the main reasons you’re dating her,” Ling said smugly, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

“Right now it’s more inconvenient than it is endearing,” she said with a ‘hmph’.

Exasperated, Ling dropped his water bottle to the padded floor and turned more fully to Lan Fan. “Okay, enough already. Why are you so adamantly refusing to go to prom? Is it because you don’t want to buy a dress?” Lan Fan turned away, but Ling stepped around her, holding eye contact. “Can’t afford a ticket?” Lan Fan spun; Ling followed. “Really hate making your girlfriend happy?”

Finally, she couldn’t take it. “ _I can’t dance_ , okay!”

Ling paused. “What?”

Lan Fan averted her gaze again, happy that Ling didn’t counter her this time. “I can’t dance. So if I go to prom I’m going to look all stiff and awkward and Paninya won’t have any fun. So I’m not going.”

Ling opened his mouth.

“—And _don’t_ say that she’ll be happy just by having me be there. You know that if I stand in the corner the entire night she’s going to spend the whole time wondering if I’m mad at her and then completely miss out on all of your prom fun.”

“I actually wasn’t going to say that at all,” Ling said. “I was going to say that I could teach you to dance, if you want. Hey, don’t give me that face, I mean it.”

“How do I know you won’t make me look stupid in front of the entire senior class?” she asked him skeptically.

Ling held up a finger. “One, don’t even try to pretend you care what our class thinks. You don’t want to look dumb in front of your girlfriend, sure, but you don’t give a shit about the rest of the kids in our school.”

He made a fair point. “And two?”

He held up a second finger. “Two, I am a man of romance, Lan Fan.” She held back a snort at that. “I wouldn’t make you look stupid in front of Paninya.” He slung an arm around her shoulders. “Plus, I’m your best friend. It’s in my job description to not make you look bad.”

Lan Fan rolled her eyes. She didn’t believe him for a second, but the thought of seeing Paninya’s smile if she finally said “yes” to one of her crazy promposals was too tempting to pass up. She was weak for that girl’s smile. “Fine. I’ll think about going to prom if—”Ling smiled brightly, “— _if_ you can make me a better dancer. But as of now I’m still not going.”

“Alright, well let’s get started then!” He picked up his phone and was already thumbing down to ‘Today’s Hip Hop and Pop Hits’ on Pandora. A song came on that Lan Fan didn’t recognize, but she as someone who didn’t listen to much music, she wasn’t surprised. It had an electronically synthesized beat that Ling was already bobbing his head to.

“Okay, what do I do first?” she asked uncertainly, reaching her hands out to grab Ling’s.

“No no no no,” Ling said smugly. “We’re not slow-dancing right now. First I have to teach you how to dab.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ling is a meme child and no one can tell me otherwise.


	3. Say Yes to the Dress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Wanna know the worst part about not having legs?" -Paninya, for just about everything that's ever inconvenienced her

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look! I haven't forgot about this drabble series! (Okay, not gonna lie, for a while I DID forget, but I remembered again! Whoohoo!) One day these kids will actually get to the dance, I promise. Just not this update. Or the next one. Or maybe even the one after that... But whatever! The preparation for the dance is like 75% of the fun of prom. 
> 
> So here's more from Paninya, our favorite Disaster Lesbian.

“Wanna know the worst part about not having any legs?” Paninya tells Winry by way of greeting. They’ve been friends for so long now that Winry supposes they’re past saying things like “hello” to each other. She takes her boots off at Paninya’s front door and follows Paninya to her room.

“What?” Winry asks good naturedly, wondering what the answer will be this time. Paninya poses this question to her at least once a week, and the responses range from very serious ableism issues to down-right silly things.

As someone who was born with a birth defect that made her legs deformed and non-functional, Paninya’s parents had them amputated when she was small so she could be fitted with prosthetics when she was older. At ten years old, Paninya was finally given her first pair of prosthetic legs.

A handicapped youth support group was actually where Paninya and Winry met. Winry had gone with Granny to pick Ed up from one of his group therapy meetings, and when she went in the building to get him she found both Ed and a new girl sitting outside their meeting room with wet washcloths pressed to their faces.  Paninya had apparently made an idle comment about how having legs meant that she finally wasn’t the shortest person in the room. Ed didn’t take the comment lightly. To this day Winry still considers it one of life’s greatest mysteries that the three of them have remained friends without those two killing each other.

From what Paninya has told Winry, she can’t remember what life was like back when she had her legs, and considering she never had legs that truly worked correctly, she’s never really missed them. Having prosthetics is a plus to her because it’s easier to get around (plus she’s taller than Ed in them, a fact that is endlessly hilarious), but if given the choice everyone knows that Paninya would rather walk around on her hands.

But, being without legs does have its disadvantages.

“I can’t wear high heels with my dress!” Paninya says, flopping herself onto her bed dramatically.

“ _That’s_ your leg plight of the week?”

Paninya sits up on her elbows to glower at Winry. “Winry, prom is about to be the best night of my young life—”

“It’s a _dance—”_

“And all the other girls are going to be wearing heels to make their butts look amazing, and I’m gonna be the only one there with a flat butt!” She flops down on her bed yet again.

Winry sighs and pats Paninya’s hand sympathetically.

“Your butt is not flat, Paninya. And you’re going to look amazing no matter what.” Paninya whines pitifully. “You’re sure you can’t make the heels work with your prosthetic legs?”

Paninya rolls over purely to fling an arm over her eyes, dramatic as always. “I can’t balance well enough in them. And if I fall down in the middle of dancing with Lan Fan I think I’ll die.”

Winry rolls her eyes. “Die, huh? Well, I guess this is pretty serious.”

“You bet your ass it is. I can’t be looking like a fool in front of her, Winry. It took so much convincing to get her to say she’d even go! Do you know how much kissing that involved?”

Winry laughs. “A true sacrifice, I’m sure.”

“I feel like you’re not taking me seriously, Rockbell.”

“That’s ‘cause I’m not, Cranz.”

“Winry!”

“Paninya, your dress doesn’t even show off your butt! It’s poufy!”

Winry goes over to Paninya’s closet and slides a few hangers out of the way until she finds Paninya’s prom dress. It’s absolutely stunning, a knee-length black dress with a rhinestone-adorned bodice, lace-cut midriff, and tu-tu style skirt with enough sparkles to keep glitter on you for days. Paninya had picked it up in a little boutique just outside of town and had spent the past week altering it to make sure that every inch of it glimmered.

Absolutely no-one would expect that a girl normally so tomboy-ish could be so in love with sparkles, but Paninya has always prided herself on being a mystery to others, so Winry couldn’t be that surprised.

She holds it up in front of Paninya, twirling it around slowly to keep as much glitter in tact as possible. “See? This skirt doesn’t even show off your butt. This is a boobs dress, for sure.”

Paninya looks at the dress, then down to her chest. She smiles deviously. “I think I can make that work in my favor.”

Winry breathes out an internal sigh of relief. Another prom crisis averted, at least for today. Winry settles in to hang out with her friend in relative peace, pulling out her Calculus notebook so she can copy some of Paninya’s homework when she notices Paninya staring down at her prosthetic legs contemplatively.

“What is it now, Paninya?”

Paninya touches her legs thoughtfully. “What are the odds of Mr. Arthur murdering me for bedazzling my legs for prom?”

It seems that homework will have to wait, because now Winry is preoccupied trying to pry a glue gun from Paninya’s glitter-covered hands.


	4. Limousine Debate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's movie night for the Central High Crew, but Paninya has ulterior motives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's actually prom season, so I figured why not finish another drabble for this AU, you know? So here's a bit more of the prom preparations featuring the entire crew, even though only like two of them are awake.

“I don’t mean to sound like a cynic here,” Paninya said as she eyed her friends, where a good 2/3 of them looked inches from death, “but I could have sworn the point of a movie night was to _watch the movie._ ”

Ling didn’t even stir from where he laid sprawled out on the couch, cheek resting on one of Ed’s legs while a small puddle of his drool darkened a patch of Ed’s jeans. Ed himself was barely conscious, his head bobbing up and down as he slipped between sleeping and waking every few seconds. Winry had left the living room a while ago to go make herself some coffee, though it was debatable if she ever made it to the kitchen. Paninya half expected to find her lying face-down in the hallway to match the younger Elric brother, who was currently lying on the floor and groaning.

“What even happened to you guys?” Paninya asked, suspiciously poking at Ling’s face. He let out a half-hearted whine and swatted in the vague direction of her hand.

Lan Fan emerged from the kitchen with a bowl of popcorn and sat down on her end of the couch next to Paninya, shaking the bowl in her girlfriend’s direction. Paninya took a handful.

“They pulled an all-nighter working on a AP Chem project,” she said simply. She held up her phone. “Ling tweeted about it the entire night.”

Paninya looked down at her girlfriend’s phone and scrolled a bit, seeing tweet after tweet from Ling in all caps.

 **Ling Yao** @actualprinceling  
I HATE THIS I WANT TO DIE

 **Ling Yao** @actualprinceling  
NO ONE CARES THIS MUCH ABOUT CHEMISTRY

 **Ling Yao** @actualprinceling  
IS IT OKAY TO BREAK-UP WITH YOUR BF OVER A GROUP PROJECT

 **Ling Yao** @actualprinceling  
WILL DESTROY THE NEXT ELRIC NERD WHO CORRECTS MY STOICHIOMETRY I SWEAR TO FUCK

“Um, is the happy couple still together?” she asks carefully.

Ed stirred from his daze long enough to nod slowly. “Only because he said he didn’t have the energy to dump me after staying up all night. Plus, it’s his own fault for not checking his math—”

“—I will punch you in the dick, Edward Elric,” came the muffled groan from his lap.

“—or paying attention, like _at all_ , in class. Really he’s pretty useless as a lab partner.” Ling stirred for a moment like he might actually rise to fight Ed, but Ed reached down and carded his hand through his boyfriend’s bangs, placating him. Ling hummed softly and laid back down.

“Wait,” Paninya said. “Why is Al tired? He’s not even in AP chemistry. He’s a junior.”

“They were doing it all wrong!” Alphonse suddenly cried from the floor. “Like, you guys had to memorize the entire periodic table for class, how could you not know the difference between a lanthanoid and an actinoid?”

“No matter how many times you say that, we’re still not gonna know what it means!” Paninya heard Winry call from the kitchen.

Both Elrics groaned in contempt. Paninya rolled her eyes. This was the problem with being friends with science nerds.

“Alphonse came to help them with their project halfway through the night. Winry and Ling weren’t much help to Edward,” Lan Fan translated, still scrolling through her Twitter Feed and munching on her popcorn.

“It’s moments like these that really make me value my general ed education,” Paninya said haughtily. “Like, I can’t remember the last time I had to pull an all-nighter for remedial Earth Science.”

“That’s because you conned _me_ into doing it for you,” Al muttered angrily.

Paninya shrugged. It wasn’t _her_ fault that he was gullible enough to be tricked into doing everyone else’s science homework.

“Some famous CEO once said he’d choose a lazy person to do a hard job because they’d find the easiest way to do it,” she said with a smirk. “I happened to find the easiest way to do homework is to have others do it for me.”

Lan Fan snorted. Alphonse groaned again.

“And anyways, I didn’t invite you guys to a movie night to have you all fall asleep on me,” Paninya said with her hands on her hips. Lan Fan quirked an eyebrow at her, and Paninya amended with a pat on Lan Fan’s knee, “Besides you, babe.”

“Paninyaaaaa,” Ling cried pitifully. “Can’t we watch the movie another night? I don’t even remember what we’re watching.”

It was some sci-fi B movie that Ed picked out during their last fight about what to watch for movie night, which meant that Paninya didn’t give a crap about the movie either. “Well, I didn’t actually invite you here to watch a movie, either,” she said with a grin. “I gathered you all here today to talk about prom.”

The three tired teenagers groaned in response. Paninya was pretty sure she heard Winry make a miserable noise from the kitchen as well.

Paninya pressed on. “One, you’re all horrible when you’re tired. Two, are we getting a limo?”

“Too show-y,” Al said from the floor.

“Too expensive,” Ed said from beside her on the couch.

“Mmrph ih,” Ling mumbled sleepily into Ed’s leg.

Winry finally returned from the kitchen, holding a dangerously large cup of coffee. She sat down cross-legged on the floor beside Alphonse’s sprawled form. “I don’t know, guys. I think a limo could be kind of fun.” The Elrics bristled briefly before she continued. “Come on, guys. You have enough money from babysitting Nina to pitch in. And what’s wrong with being a little corny and flashy for one night? Isn’t that what prom is all about?”

Paninya’s smile lit up her whole face. “That’s my girl! I vote limo too.” She held up her hand and ticked off her fingers. “All right, that means we have two for the limo, two against the limo, one—” Paninya nudged Ling with her elbow. He didn’t move. “—unconscious person, and one vote left.” She turned her full body to face Lan Fan. “So. Babe. As the tie-breaker vote, what’s the final decision?”

Lan Fan scrunched up her nose, adorably and angrily. “How is that fair? I didn’t even _want_ to go to prom and now you’re making me the swing vote?” All eyes remained on her, but Lan Fan was only looking to Paninya, who was doing her best to give her girlfriend the strongest puppy dog eyes she had in her arsenal. “Now _that’s_ definitely not fair.”

Paninya did not waiver. Lan Fan continued to scowl for five more seconds.

Then she gave in.

“Fine! We’ll get you your stupid limo.”

“Yes!” Paninya fist pumped in victory. “You’re the best, did you know that?”

Lan Fan grumbled unhappily until Paninya kissed her, a million little ones on her nose and cheeks and lips until Lan Fan was giggling and pushing her away before she knocked the popcorn off her lap. “You’re lucky you’re cute,” she said breathlessly, trying to return her face to its usual sternness and failing.

Paninya kissed her once more. “Oh, I know it.”

She turned to her friends once more, already pulling out her phone to bring up the info for the four limousine websites she had researched, but when she looked up, half of her friends were asleep. She turned to Winry and Paninya, the two most perfect girls in the entire world and also the only conscious people left in the room, and sighed. Instead she reached into her front overalls pocket, where she had kept an assortment of different colored markers for this very purpose.

“Ladies, I’m afraid we’ll have to wait to book a limo for now. Until then,” she gravely handed the two girls a marker each, “there’s only one thing left to do.”

The photos were posted on Instagram immediately, as was tradition for any sleepover Paninya hosted. “FLEA” in all caps was written across Edward’s forehead in rainbow colors, Winry’s sketchy script recognizable to anyone. Ling’s cheek, the one that wasn’t resting on Ed’s thigh, had “PEASANT” scrawled on it, a meme from ages ago that Lan Fan knew Ling _hated_ with a passion. Alphonse’s sleeping face was mercifully saved, since Paninya owed Al for doing all of her science homework since the beginning of time. Paninya instead slapped a sticky note to the unconscious junior’s forehead with a little halo drawn in orange sharpie.

“Which do you think they’ll be more mad about, the limo vote they missed, or the face doodles?” Winry asked as she pulled out the air compressor our of the storage closet for the blow-up mattress.

Paninya shrugged, leading the girls into her room and away from the snoring boys in the living room. “Doesn’t matter to me,” she said with smile.

This is was what they got for falling asleep during movie night, anyway.


End file.
